A Cattle Rancher Who Won’t Eat Meat: Mad Cowboy

Do you find it challenging to stay on a plant-based diet?  Get inspired and motivated from a Mad Cowboy who went from being a cattle rancher and a meat and potato man to being vegetarian.

Why You Should Read Mad Cowboy

Reading Mad Cowboy opens your eyes to how cattle are raised, how cattle ranching has affected the land and the environment, and the health of people.

The goals of my review of Mad Cowboy are:

1. To inform you about the book.
2. To share with you key points in the book that provide information about cattle ranching
3. Inspire you to read more books that help solidify your commitment to eating a plant-based diet.

Eye Opening About My Land

Mad Cowboy opened my eyes to how cattle ranchers started out raising cattle the natural way.  The cattle ate a natural diet and the land naturally replenished itself, because of crop rotation, which resulted in the environment staying in tact.  The land was less polluted and more fertile than it is today.

I am blessed to live on the land that my husband’s grandfather used to raise food.  Grandfather raised cows, chickens and pigs.  He planted crops that yielded very well.

I have had the opportunity of planting a garden in the same area that my husband’s grandfather planted his garden.  The year I planted the garden, my harvest was plentiful.  Check out my tomato harvest.

My husband’s grandfather left the land in good condition.  It is hard to keep the rabbits, deer and other little critters away from the garden.  I am thankful that our grandfather left us land that has life.

A Few Take-Away Points

Old-fashioned farming is a thing of the past.  Sometimes, the easiest and fastest way, may not be the best way.

“Crop rotation was the first principle of the old-fashioned organic method of dairy farming employed by my father, grandfather and great-grandfather.” (p. 52)

The modern-day farmer’s biggest concern is making money as fast as he or she can, by any means necessary.  The farmer is not thinking about the impact he or she has on the land, the environment, or even human beings.

“To make the cattle grow faster, I didn’t restrict myself to merely forcing upon them an unnatural diet of grain.  Like most cattle farmers today, I used hormones to stimulate growth of the animals.” (p. 57)

The Mad Cows and Bureaucrat chapter is one where the author shares when the mad cow disease was first discovered in Great Britain and he also shares how the bureaucrats handled the mad cow scare.

“There had never been (and still has never been) any confirmed cases of BSE (bovine spongiform encephalopathy), brain-waisting disease, in the United States.  But every year about a hundred thousand cows in this country die mysteriously of what is known as Downer Cow Syndrome.” (p. 87)

Think of the money that would be saved if cattle were allowed to eat the natural diet they were meant to eat.  It is hard to believe that the majority of the grain grown in this country is fed to animals, when there are people starving.  This does not make sense.

“…remember it takes roughly sixteen pounds of grain to create one pound of beef.” (p. 125)

“Eighty percent of American grain production is currently destined for the gullets of animals.” (p. 125)

It is a sad day when the ranchers have more say so over land-use policies than the residents.  It is all about the money. 

“The thousand or so ranchers who graze their cattle on public land in Arizona, for instance, have far more say in that state’s land-use policies than its other 3.7 million residents combined.” (p. 136)

Discovering that a cattle rancher goes vegan is hard to believe.  If this isn’t encouraging, I don’t know what is?

“I decided to try to be a vegan.  For a person who hadn’t even heard the term a year before, it was a giant step.  Frankly, I didn’t think I could do it.” (p. 176)

“It took me, therefore, about a year to make the full transition from meat-eater to vegan.  In retrospect, I wish I had become vegan sooner.” (p. 176)

Mad Cowboy:  Plain Truth From the Cattle Rancher Who Won’t Eat Meat

About the Author:  Howard Lyman is the author of Mad Cowboy.  Lyman is a a fourth-generation Montana rancher.  He investigated the use of chemicals in agriculture after developing a spinal tumor that nearly paralyzed him.

Lyman is now a vegetarian, who uncovers the propaganda of beef and dairy interests – and the government agencies that protect them – to expose an animal-based diet as the primary cause of cancer, heart disease, and obesity in this country.

Lyman warns that the livestock industry is repeating the mistakes that led to Mad Cow disease in England while simultaneously causing serious damage to the environment. (back cover of book)

Cost:  U.S.  $14.00 | Can. $16.00

Total Pages:  223

Reading:  Book is an easy read and the author is down to earth.

Final Thoughts About Mad Cowboy

Once your start reading Mad Cowboy, you will not want to put it down.  It is one thing to see how the animals are treated on those videos that get leaked to the public, but it is another thing to learn what goes on behind the scenes in the world of cattle ranching.

If you are a person who cares about the environment, you get a lesson on how the land has been polluted with agricultural chemicals that are used in cattle ranching as well as farming.

I recommend that anyone who eats a plant-based diet, or is considering eating a plant-based diet, read this book.  After reading this book, you will be more determined than ever to eat a plant-based diet.